The insider trading case jury made quick work of deliberations, following a lengthy 4-week trial of Rajat Gupta, the retired head of the consulting firm McKinsey & Company and a former Goldman Sachs board member, who was charged with providing material confidential information to Galleon hedge fund manager Rajat Rajaratnam on 3 occasions. Rajat Gupta, 63, was found guilty on Friday of conspiracy and securities fraud by the federal jury of eight women and four men in only its 2nd day of deliberations.  He was also convicted of conspiring in an insider trading scheme with Mr. Rajaratnam.  Securities fraud carries a maximum prison sentence of 20 years, and conspiracy carries a 5-year maximum.  Gupta will remain free on bail until his sentencing hearing, on 10/18/12. Mr. Gupta was found not guilty of 2 instances of tipping Rajaratnam, including an allegation that he divulged secret news about Procter & Gamble, where he also served on the board. Gupta showed no reaction while the verdict was read.  His wife, Anita, buried her head in her hands, leaning against a bench in the courtroom.  His 4 daughters, who had squeezed into the front row of the spectators’ gallery each day during the trial, loudly sobbed and consoled one another.  Several jurors were crying as they left the courtroom. The outcome is a victory for the office of Manhattan U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara and the FBI in their assault on insider trading, which used tools normally employed against organized crime, including phone taps and informants.  Mr. Gupta is one of the 66 Wall Street traders and corporate executives charged with insider trading crimes by Mr. Bharara, since 2009.  He's also the most prominent of those convicted at trial or to plead guilty.  Of the 66 people charged, 60 have either pleaded guilty or been found guilty, and juries have now convicted all seven who have taken their cases to trial. Prosecution credit the Berkshire Hathaway investment ... as their key point in the case.  It focused on a board meeting at Goldman Sachs on 9/23/08, as the stock market plunged following the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.  At the trial, Goldman CEO Lloyd Blankfein testified that he briefed his board over the phone on the Buffett investment beginning at 3:15 p.m.  Within a minute after the call with the directors concluded at 3:53 p.m., Rajaratnam answered a call on his private line from a McKinsey conference room being used by Gupta, according to phone records and testimony. Rajaratnam got off a call and hurriedly told Ananth Muniyappa, then a Galleon trader, to buy Goldman Sachs stock, Muniyappa testified. Galleon bought 267,000 shares.  Prosecutors played a wiretapped recording of a Rajaratnam phone call from the next day.

• "I got a call at 3:58, right?" Rajaratnam could be heard telling trader Ian Horowitz.  "Saying something good might happen to Goldman."
• Other evidence focused on Galleon’s sale of 150,000 Goldman Sachs shares on 10/24/08, when the bank was losing money while Wall Street expected a profit.
• Jurors listened to a wiretap of Rajaratnam telling Mr. Horowitz, "I heard yesterday from somebody that was on the board of Goldman Sachs that they were going to lose $2 a share.  The market has them making $2.50."

The case is U.S. v. Gupta, 11-cr-00907, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).    [Dealbook, 6/15/12] and [Bloomberg, 6/15/12]